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Robert Martyr has been in professional wrestling for more than a decade, and on Saturday he looks to add a win against a “legitimate legend” in Bárbaro Cavernario.
Martyr and Cavernario’s match is one of the matches on a stacked card that will take place at Pandemonium: Pro Wrestling’s Dismantling Summer event in Portland, Oregon. Martyr told Pakinomist Digital that he was a bit apprehensive about taking on the fight before committing to it.
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Robert Martyr prepares for his upcoming battle. (Provided to Pakinomist Digital)
“I’ve been back and forth on it,” he said in a recent interview. “Like, I was going back and forth on the match when it was presented to me. You always get into things. You always have this level of impostor syndrome. But then I realized, dude, I’ve been doing this for 11 years. It’s time to stop sulking. I’ve been doing this for 11 years. I’m good at what I do. It really doesn’t matter how often or not, how often. I wrestle, but when I get in the ring, I make i magic
“I’m very excited. I know a lot about Bárbaro. He’s one of the best in the world. Legitimately has been one of the best in the world for maybe 10 years. I’m no stranger to Lucha. I was born and raised in Lucha. I studied it. It was my first style when I learned to do pro wrestling very, very much, I’ll be happy. with Pandemonium – at this point my home promotion is that he’s wrestled everything. I going to experience it with a legit legend and I’m not going.
Martyr started professional wrestling when he was just a teenager. He said he got hooked on the sport by watching old Lucha Libre tapes that his grandmother had recorded.
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While others grew up watching either WWE (the then World Wrestling Federation) and World Championship Wrestling, Martyr said he got hooked on Lucha Libre AAA Worldwide (AAA) and Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL).
“I started professional wrestling at 14. I got into it because my grandmother was a big fan of wrestling. She was always recording wrestling. She had tapes of AAA and CMLL,” he told Pakinomist Digital. “Funnily enough, I didn’t grow up on WWE at all. I grew up on Lucha Libre. That’s all I saw from maybe the time I was 3 or 4 years old.
Professional wrestler Robert Martyr punches his opponent in the head. (Provided to Pakinomist Digital)
“Eventually, you know, I had ADHD, I’m like, man, I can’t seem to stay still, and my mom tried to find a sport and nothing worked. And I said why don’t I just try wrestling. I don’t know if it’s possible. I found a school. They made us sign a waiver and the rest is history. So I’ve been doing pretty much what I’ve done in high school. boxing, Muy Thai I’m in music, I do a lot of things.
Martyr said his hope was to bring out some emotion in those watching. He wants to make people feel all kinds of emotions when he performs in the ring.
Like most professional wrestlers, it’s taken a while to get there, and the grind wouldn’t be like this if it weren’t for wild stories to go along the way.
Martyr shared his own story of being booked in his first show from his home state of Florida.
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“The craziest thing was probably when I drove 20 hours to Chicago to wrestle for three minutes. That was quite something. Professional wrestler, she’s amazing, Janai Kai, was in that car. EK Prosper, from NXT, was in that car too. We were all together,” he explained. “I started with those guys. We got this booking and we were like, you know what, this is our first out-of-state (based in Florida) booking, we’re making it happen. We’re going. We’re going to get all our money together, drive up there. So we drive up there and it’s just a mess. It’s like the worst running show you’ve ever seen in your life.
“No one knows what’s going on. The promoter doesn’t know what’s going on. He’d basically forgotten that he’d booked me specifically. He’d forgotten that I was even there. So when I showed up, he’s like, ‘Wait, I booked you?’ Florida, to Chicago, Illinois and back. Like 40 hours for a two-minute squash match.”
Indie wrestler Robert Martyr sees the professional wrestling ring. (Provided to Pakinomist Digital)
Martyr admitted that he took the loss on that trip and may not even have been paid for his trouble.
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Going forward, he said he hoped to win some gold in the near future. If he does, it would be the first championship he has held in his professional wrestling career.
